Time for a reality check during the long march

While Julia Gillard says there is a time for governing and a time for campaigning, there is also a time for reality checks. Time is what she has given us by naming the election date eight months early, for September 14. And for many voters that day can't come soon enough.

They don't particularly rate Gillard or Tony Abbott - many preferring Kevin Rudd v Malcolm Turnbull - but Gillard and Abbott will almost certainly be the ones battling for the prime minister's chair in September.

And the campaign is off to a shaky start for the PM with the resignation of two ministers.

There will be numerous urgent challenges for whoever wins. Head of the list will be the economy. To be sure Australia is in an enviable position compared with the stagnant economies of Europe and the US, where unemployment at 7.8 per cent is a third higher than it is here. But there are weak spots.

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People are worried about jobs for their children. The Gonski education reforms must proceed no matter who holds office.

There are also daunting challenges in the provision of infrastructure and improvements in transport for the outer areas of the big cities. And the protection of the environment and the slow march away from a coal- and gas-dependent economy towards renewable energy.

Then there are issues that define us as a nation. The advancement of Aboriginal Australians and the closing of the life-expectancy gap between indigenous and non-indigenous. The parties also must compromise on offshore processing and the right of asylum seekers to work. Most of this is no-brainer politics but the solutions have eluded our politicians.

The polls have put the Coalition in an election-winning position ever since the Gillard government was confirmed in office in August 2010.

In part this is a tribute to a most effective Opposition Leader. But there are still big questions about how Tony Abbott would finance his generous parental leave scheme while winding back the carbon tax and mining tax.

Abbott is openly courting the old Howard battlers by emphasising he is not anti-union, only anti unions that rip off their workers, and events have given him a sturdy platform on that issue. But he gets only qualified praise from business for his plans. Abbott has succeeded in wounding the government, but he has not entirely convinced the public he would do a better job.

It is enough at this early stage to call for a good clean bout. Australians deserve a government that looks outward to the people it serves, not inward to the spoils of office.

If indeed the curtain falls on Australia's first female prime minister it will be because they found her wanting on policy grounds, not because women are destroying the joint, to quote the lamentable jibe. We are only at the beginning of the march of the best and brightest women to the top positions in the land.